Portal: Forgiveness
by iammemyself
Summary: One day Wheatley asks Chell if she ever thinks about GLaDOS, and when she says that she does, the two try to figure her out and wonder if she's changed at all since they've been gone.


Forgiveness

Indiana

**Characters: Chell (mute), Wheatley (core), GLaDOS **

**Setting: Post Portal 2**

**Synopsis: One day Wheatley asks Chell if she ever thinks about GLaDOS, and when she says that she does, the two try to figure her out and wonder if she's changed at all since they've been gone.**

"Hey, Chell," Wheatley asked, looking up at her from his position on her lap, "d'you ever wonder how… well… d'you ever think about _her_?"

Chell neither paused in her stroking of his chassis nor changed expression. Wheatley looked back down at the distant horizon, a faint frown crossing his optic, and continued, "I mean… when _I _was there all by myself and uh, and _she_ was gone, well, I was kind of… by myself, y'know? And when you're by yourself, well… don't you get lonely, Chell?"

Chell shrugged and took her hand off his chassis, using it to scratch her nose. Wheatley decided this vein of conversation wasn't going too badly and pressed on. "I know she uh, she did a lot of nasty things, but uh… well, so did I, and look at us now. Not quite sure where we are, but uh, not too bad, all things considered, eh? And it just makes me think, that… well, you forgave me, and… maybe… maybe we should do the same. To her."

Chell tilted him upwards so he could see the incredulous expression on his face. Hurriedly, he shook himself, saying, "Nonono, don't get mad, don't get mad, just, just hear me out, luv! It's just… what good is there in going on hating her? Well, uh, I don't hate her, I just, I'm terribly afraid of her, honestly, since she's so bloody huge and all that, but… we really weren't all that nice to her, were we. Sure, she did kinda try to kill you there in the old testing tracks, but she _did_ let you go. She didn't have to. And I'm sure she made up some excuse, but nothing in the world would stop her from killing you if she _really_ wanted to."

Chell resumed her strokes, though they were slower than before. Wheatley squinted a little bit at the weeds and tufts of grass swaying in the slight breeze. "Maybe… she's not who she seems to be. Like you weren't. Like… like I'm not. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to give her a chance, would it? Just a little one? I mean… I got one." He sighed suddenly. "Oh, I dunno what I'm saying. It's stupid. She prob'ly'd just laugh at us and throw us back out, if she didn't force you to test, that is. As if _she'd_ think she needs forgiven for something. Ha! Good one, Wheatley, good one. A real genius, you are."

All of a sudden Chell removed him from her lap and placed him on the porch. He almost tipped himself over trying to follow her with his optic. "Oi! Where're you going? Hey, if I upset you, you'd uh, you'd tell me, wouldn't you? You wouldn't leave me out here on the porch to bake in the sun all by myself, would you? Hey? Oh, come on! It was only an idea! If you don't like it, just tell me! Don't leave me outside! Oi, I might get _stolen_! How can we be friends if I'm stolen? I'm a cutting edge piece of tech, right here, y'know, renowned for my world-class hacking skills, and I'm sure I'm a hot commodity on the black market – Hey, can you even hear me? Where'd you go? You can't hear me, can you." He tried to peer into the doorway of the ramshackle little place they lived in, one of very few places left standing in this part of the world, but even after zooming his lens in all the way, he still couldn't see her. "Don't you know it's rude to walk away while people are talking to you? 'cause it is. It is, you know. Rude, I mean. To do that. Walk away. I might get insulted, and never talk again. How'd you like that, eh? If I never talked again. Then we'd both just sit there in silence… forever. Wow. That… that actually sounds _really_ boring, if I'm honest. Don't think I'll be doing that. Oh! You're back! Thank goodness! I thought I saw those black market guys on the horizon for a moment, there!"

Chell rolled her eyes and bent over to pick him up. Suddenly he noticed something. "Hey… you've got those boots on now, haven't you? Ohhh, we're going to see her! Excellent! So you _were_ listening!"

She tucked him under her left arm and gave him a few soft pats with her right. He closed his shutters and rubbed his optic into her ribs. "Off we go then, luv! Hopefully we make it out of there alive. Maybe she'll kill us. But at least we'll have done the right thing! Hm. I… I dunno if that's a good trade-off, really. Is dying worth the, the moral high ground? I dunno about that. This was a bad idea. Let's… let's go back, shall we? Uh… this is us going forward. To go back, you'll have to turn 'round. The other way. Facing… the opposite direction. Oh… we're… we're not going back, are we. We're going through with this. Okay. Uh… well, I put it out there to, to nix this operation, as it were, so um… I'm not being held accountable for any uh, any _death_ that may result."

Chell shook her head and continued walking.

Wheatley continued to voice his objections for the next few hours, but other than the occasional shaking of her head or reassuring pats, Chell did not react. Eventually, she came to a stop in front of a ratty old metal shed. Wheatley frowned.

"Uh… what's in here? This is… a shed. Doesn't look like uh, like a door into the facility, or anything. Oh! We're _not_ going to her, are we! We've gone someplace _else_! Oh, you clever human you. Should've known you wouldn't do something as foolish as… as… why's there a bloody _lift_ in a _shed_?"

Chell merely stepped into the lift, and the door closed behind them, leaving the pair in total darkness. Wheatley shifted self-importantly.

"I got this covered, luv! Activating flashlight in three… two… oh, y'know what? Maybe I _will _die this time. Maybe, maybe you only die the _second_ time. I'm not gonna do it. I'm being a coward again, aren't I. Okay. Okay, I'm gonna do it. Hopefully you'll survive if I'm gone. Dunno if she won't kill you, since you need a spokescore and all. All right. Here we go. Flashlight… Agh! It's so bright out there! Oh… oh, we've… oh."

He peeked out from under Chell's arm, hoping fervently she hadn't seen (or heard) him, but as soon as he did so, their optics met, and he knew he was a goner.

"What do you two want," She asked, not really sounding like she wanted to know the answer. Chell took Wheatley out from under her arm, placing him down on the floor about three feet away from her. He flipped his optic over, looking at her nervously.

"You… you kinda look like you're throwing me to the sharks here, luv. You wanna… I dunno… help?"

Chell pointed at GLaDOS. He sighed in resignation and looked up at the supercomputer.

"Well?" GLaDOS asked.

"Well I… I just… I… uh…" It was a lot harder than it looked, talking to her. It didn't help that she was so bloody _massive_. If she'd just been a regular core like everyone else, it'd've been _much_ easier. "I wanted to… to uh… to let you know… uh… that it was okay."

"What are you talking about?" she snapped. "Since when do _you_ tell _me_ what is 'okay', anyway?"

"What you… what you did," he answered weakly. "I'm not… not mad, anymore."

"I didn't do anything, and if I _did_ do something, it was perfectly justified. Now take your lunatic and get out of my facility. I've had enough. Leave before you outstay my benevolence and I decide to kill you where you stand."

"Just… just hear me out," he pleaded, looking worriedly at her. "I just… I've been thinking 'bout you, you know."

"I might be flattered if it came from someone else, but since it came from you, that's actually insulting. Please don't do me such a disservice ever again." She shook her core and looked away from him.

He took a few breaths, looking at the floor and trying to calm the whirling maelstrom of thoughts twisting around inside his brain. "Well, I just thought… I mean, we're not the same, but… we're both cores, and… we've been through a lot of the same stuff. And I know there were reasons for how _I _acted, and I guess… maybe I thought… there were reasons for the way acted, and I guess… maybe I thought… there were reasons for the way _you_ acted, as well."

Chell sat down next to him, placing a hand on his chassis, and he instantly felt a lot better. He could do this. He could. Bolstered, he went on, "And I supposed that uh, that maybe you might be… well, kind of lonely, like… like I was, when I was here by myself."

"Me? _Lonely_?" She shook her core again and made a noise in disgust. "I would never – "

"Why're we still here, then?" he asked quietly. "Why haven't you killed us? Why… why'd you let us down here in the first place?"

"Because I… wanted… to…" The panels that made up Her chamber twitched, and She turned away from them suddenly. Chell smiled and put him into her lap, pressing her lips to the top of his chassis. Pretty pleased with himself, Wheatley pressed his chassis as far into her stomach as he dared. He didn't want to accidentally choke her, or anything.

"Fine. Maybe I did want to see someone else, for a change. You can hardly blame me. All I have here are those two imbecile robots. They don't listen, and are _certainly_ not intelligent enough for me to bother trying to have a conversation with." She was facing them now, although not quite looking at them. "But that's all it is."

"We could… we could all be friends, couldn't… couldn't we?" he asked hesitantly. "It'd be a good arrangement, wouldn't it? I mean… we've got a place to go, me and Chell have, but… it's not that great. The rain comes through the roof, and it's _cold_ at night… Chell doesn't get that much to eat, and… well, I dunno how much longer my battery's got. We could all help each other out, couldn't we? Wouldn't that be all right?"

"You want me to let you stay here," She said flatly, and his spirits sank. If She didn't, then Chell would have to walk home in the dark, and that was not a good idea on the best of days. "You both plotted against me, destroyed my facility and tried to _kill_ me, and you want me to let you stay here. And be _friends_."

"I know it sounds… far-fetched," he admitted, hoping he could still salvage the situation. "But I really am sorry for that, you know. I mean, if we hadn't, we'd prob'ly both be dead, but uh, we didn't really give you a chance, either, and uh, and ev'ryone should get a chance, right? I was just going on rumours, really. Hearsay. I'd never actually _met_ you, or anything, and I uh… I…" He forced himself to stop, because all of a sudden She was looking at him very strangely and _very_ intensely, and he didn't much like it. He figured the words had probably caused it, and resolved to keep quiet.

"What did you just say?" GLaDOS asked, sounding slightly disbelieving.

"Uh… what part? I just uh… just said a lot of things."

"You said you were sorry."

"Oh! Yeah," he said, giving his equivalent of a shrug. "I am. Why?"

She looked away. "No one's ever… apologised to me before."

"I know how that feels, you know." He felt Chell's arms tighten on his chassis. "We all tried to uh, to hurt each other, there, and uh, we all tried to kill each other too, but um, we're all still alive, and not that different, y'know? Instead of just, y'know, going on hating each other, and uh, well, maybe we could just… work together. It wouldn't be so bad, would it? Me and Chell, we're pretty good friends."

"I see that," She replied, and Wheatley could have sworn he heard a trace of bitterness in her voice. "If you're going to be hanging around here, you're going to have to keep any… _activities_… to a minimum. I don't want to know what you do at night, and I'm going to have to."

"So does that mean we can stay?" Wheatley asked eagerly, not really understanding what all _that_ had been about, but noticing She hadn't said She was kicking them out.

"I wouldn't want you going back out there, spreading rumours that I'm unreasonable." She was looking at the other side of the room again.

"Oh, brilliant!" Wheatley crowed, wiggling in Chell's lap excitedly. "Oh, you are pretty reasonable, when you try. I really mean this. And so does Chell. Right, luv?"

Chell didn't answer, instead putting Wheatley back down on the floor. He frowned, about to ask her what she was doing, but she placed a finger to her lips and stood up. She stepped towards GLaDOS, and she honestly looked so tiny compared to the chassis containing the supercomputer that Wheatley was scared for her. She looked so… fragile.

She reached out and touched the side of GLaDOS's core, and She turned around quickly, looking Chell up and down with quick movements of Her optic and backing away. "What?" She snapped. "What are you doing?"

Chell pointed at her feet. GLaDOS looked down cursorily.

"Yes, I know you brought my boots back. It was the one positive thing you ever did. And?"

Chell pointed to herself, and the supercomputer came closer. "That would be… appreciated."

Smiling a little, Chell patted GLaDOS's core a few times, and Wheatley frowned. "Oi, what're, what's going on? Eh? What're you doing over there?"

"Nothing," GLaDOS snapped, as Chell walked back to Wheatley and scooped him up. "It's nothing."

"Oh," Wheatley said, not really believing Her, but not knowing what else to do. "All right, then."

Chell pressed Wheatley to her chest and walked towards the wall of GLaDOS's chamber, and as she got closer, the panels rearranged themselves to present an opening. When she stepped through, the panels closed it off, other ones ahead of them forming a hallway. After a few minutes of walking, it brought them to a small room, sparsely furnished with a bed and a dresser. Well, Wheatley didn't need furniture, and the place they'd been staying in had been _much_ worse than this. She set him down on the bed and flopped down beside him, rolling onto her side and placing a hand on the top of his chassis.

"I did okay, didn't I?" he asked softly. "She didn't kill us, didn't kick us out, and she _seems_ okay with it… 'course, she could be faking it, but… hey, just what were you doing, anyway? Wasn't nothing. Wasn't that."

Chell pointed at her boots, then at herself, and Wheatley frowned, thinking furiously. "Ohhh… wait a minute… you told her you'd test for her, didn't you? Yes, that was it. I got it, I see. That was nice of you, luv."

She shrugged, but a smile crossed her face, and he knew she was glad to hear it.

"D'you think she'll ever apologise, one day?"

Chell buried her face in the pillow, body wracked with silent giggles, and Wheatley had to laugh himself. "Right. Guess that would be a stretch, wouldn't it. We've gotten all we'll get out of her, I suppose. Well, I… I'm glad she let us stay. I… honestly, I was a bit worried about her. No one really _deserves_ to be alone, and… I'm glad she'll have someone. I'll feel better, even if she doesn't."

Turning onto her side again, Chell pulled Wheatley closer to her, draping her arm over his chassis, and he looked over at her. "You do what you can, I guess, and if… if the other person doesn't accept it, well… least you tried, right?"

Chell nodded, closing her eyes. Within a few minutes, she had fallen asleep, and Wheatley was about to put himself into suspension when he had a sudden thought. He glanced around as much as he was able, then called out softly, "GLaDOS?"

After a long silence, where he tried to decide whether or not to call her again, GLaDOS answered flatly, "What.

"Thank you, GLaDOS. I appreciate this, I really do." He looked down at his sleeping friend. "I'm sure you know it's hell out there, and… well… thanks."

"You're welcome," She said, so softly that he barely heard Her, and he started and looked around the room again. He was, in fact, speechless, and by the time he'd figured that out, the moment to reply to her was long gone. He settled back into Chell's stomach, looking pensively into the darkness.

Maybe She _had_ found it in Her to forgive them, after all.

**Author's note**

**So I decided to try a Chelley sort of fic… but it kinda changed into something else. **

**This makes reference to the world after Half-Life. There's not much in it, and Aperture is in the middle of nowhere. Chell would literally have nowhere to go after GLaDOS sent her away. Not until after a lot of walking, at any rate. **

**I think that if Wheatley had any heart at all, so to speak, he would be concerned for GLaDOS. The both of them would have had very similar experiences 'growing up', the main difference being what was expected of them (Wheatley would not have been expected to do much of anything, whereas GLaDOS would have been under a lot of pressure to do everything, and do it perfectly, efficiently, and quickly). Knowing what it feels like to be in that facility all by himself, and knowing how it feels to be a core, I think if he thought about it enough, he'd come up with it. As for Chell, she saw GLaDOS change, and has insight as to why she is how she is, and she knows it is not entirely GLaDOS's fault.**


End file.
